Noli Me Tangere

Shelley Wong

the fields were scribbled on or as blank as envelopes
*
to write about birds & not think hunter
not think bright cage for two
*
on the train, I slept in shuttering light through a bombed city returned to its Baroque splendor
*
a friend once said the body knows
*
I played the ingénue the floating flower stalls lit through the rain like a beautiful alphabet the azaleas were a parting gift as I drew a zipper shut across the continent—
*
women are familiar with surrender
& the appearance of it

SHELLEY WONG is a Kundiman fellow and the author of the chapbook Rare Birds (Diode Editions). Her poems have appeared in Crazyhorse, Sixth Finch, Vinyl, and other journals. She is a recipient of a Pushcart Prize and fellowships from the MacDowell Colony and the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop.